Duke Students for an Ethical Duke

Friday, May 2, 2008

Kristin Butler recently became the top winner of The National Society of Newspaper Columnists Educational Foundation Scholarship contest, announced on April 24th. Editor and Publisher published an article about it. Surprisingly, the Chronicle opted not to report it in Monday's paper, though they were notified, but we are posting it here nonetheless.

Two of the judges had this to say about Butler and her work:

Goodman commented: “A good combination of reporting and opinion with a tough look at her own administration. Liked the variety as well, from health care to stripping!”

Suzette Martinez Standring, a preliminary judge, also commented on Butler. “Articulate and well-researched columns on social justice topics. Her Voice and point of view is one to be reckoned with.”

"I'm thrilled by the Society's decision, and grateful for the opportunity to visit New Orleans and interview Katrina victims this June," said Butler. Her First Prize also comes with $1000. Kristin has not decided yet how to put that to use.

Saturday, April 19, 2008

David Horowitz's appearance at Duke prompted fierce opposition from the Chronicle. Such a stance seems to be an extraordinary step for the editorial board, as we cannot remember anything similar for other speakers brought to Duke. The editorial called him an "inflammatory demagogue" and then went on to take shots at the Duke Conservative Union claiming a "preference on the part of Duke Conservative Union for inciting belligerent dispute rather than encouraging intelligent discourse."

Aside from being high on inciting and accusatory language and low on substantiation or information of any sort for that matter, the little information the editorial did attempt to provide was quite inaccurate. It seems rather clear that the Chronicle horribly mischaracterized Horowitz's views on Academic Freedom and inaccurately claimed Horowitz has called for the removal of parts of the Koran.

No other examples come to mind of the Chronicle writing a staff editorial denouncing a campus speaker brought by a student group - or any other group - in such a fashion. It seems to be an infrequent occurrence at most. It is especially odd for the newspaper to dismiss Horowitz as an incendiary demagogue seeking shock value when the same newspaper gave a platform to Shadee Malaklou for an entire year. When asked how the Chronicle - a Duke sanctioned monopoly - could retain the services of such an uniformed and slanderous individual as Malaklou, one of the Chronicle's senior editors answered, "readership." People would read the Chronicle on the day of Malaklou's column simply to see what absurd and outrageous nonsense she had published.

A rape may not have occurred on March 13, but as a woman on Duke’s campus, as a Woman’s Studies major, and as activist for survivors of sexual assault, I assure Mr. Cheshire that these men are not innocent, nor are they upstanding citizens of Duke or Durham law….Nifong might not be in the right legally, but that doesn’t mean he's not doing the right thing.

Moreover, the Chronicle accused Horowitz as someone who seeks to obstruct free speech and censor college professors - which seems completely inaccurate from reading the Academic Bill of Rights - yet the Chronicle refused to print a paid advertisement in advance of Horowitz's speech calling for an end to genocide, calling it incendiary. It is tough to reconcile that stance with the Chronicle's assertion that "unlike the man himself, we trust students' ability to freely form opinions rather than be forced into them, despite the 'dangerous' ideas that we allow to be expressed on our campus."

Worst of all, it should be clear from the video below as it was at the event that it was nothing like the Chronicle's characterization whatsoever. It was informative and there was plenty of constructive dialog. A number of Muslim students showed up with tough questions and challenged Horowitz frequently. He answered them all. Several Muslim students congratulated Horowitz in person after the event and expressed their gratitude to him for coming. Two of them requested his autograph.

The Chronicle then ran a story to which Chronicle Chief Editor David Graham gave the title "Horowitz Sounds Off to Small Crowd." It should be noted that there were closer to 90-100 attendants, nearly double the 50 claimed by the Chronicle (the room held 180 and was at least half full). In fairness to the Duke Conservative Union, who sponsored the event, calling that a "small crowd" completely lacks perspective when it comes to speakers sponsored by student groups, especially around exam time. One cannot help but note the irony that the Chronicle mocks the speech for a low attendance (inaccurately) after publishing an editorial (whose two attempted facts were both dead wrong) ensuring that the entire campus should dismiss the speaker as an inflammatory bigot incapable of reasoned discussion.

DSEDuke was not involved in bringing Horowitz to Duke, but we have agreed to post the video online anyway so that all may judge for themselves whether Horowitz, his speech, or the DCU have been treated fairly by David Graham's Chronicle.

Friday, April 18, 2008

The New York Times and Washington Post have reported on the plight of Grace Wang, and the Times has provided the above photo depicting the viciousness of the confrontation faced by Wang. Attendants of the pro-Tibet vigil have reported to us that the rhetoric directed at her was largely unfit for print.

But Grace Wang's role in the conflicting demonstrations has been widely misunderstood, especially by those in the Chinese blogosphere that have demanded that her life be terminated by any number of creative or ancient means. She was not a party to either side. As she has explained and participants of the vigil have confirmed, she arrived at what had become a chaotic scene and sought to mediate between the two groups and encourage a more peaceful, understanding, and thoughtful demonstration.

She has repeatedly made clear that she does not advocate Tibetan independence to any who will listen. Unfortunately, the pro-China demonstrators seem to have had little interest and drown her out with chants and accusations. She does, however, advocate fair treatment and more freedom for Tibet, much as she advocates more freedom throughout China.

As her message is slowly getting out, Grace tells us that some of the thousands of emails she has received have been supportive - including emails from China - though that portion remains a minority.

[Update 5:49 pm 4/18/08]WRAL also ran the story last night and have published an article on their website.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Grace Wang, who has recently decided to identify herself publicly, was publicly outed recently by members of the Duke Chinese Scholars and Students Association on their website for attending a pro-Tibet vigil. Her name and her involvement in the vigil have exploded in the Chinese blogosphere and in internet forums, and she has received an onslaught of threatening and harassing phone calls, as have her parents in her home town of Qingdao, China. A video of Wang participating in the vigil was also posted on YouTube, and has received over 640,000 views and counting. The video has since been reposted by many others as well. From the reports we have heard from pro-Tibet participants, the treatment of Wang by the crowd of pro-China protesters consisted primarily of a barrage of profanity and insults.

More recently, as the Chronicle reports, Wang's parents' apartment in China has been vandalized with a bucket of feces poured in front of its door.

Wang has been participating in numerous interviews, one of which we have clipped for your convenience. Here is Wang on PRI's The World.

This development comes as little surprise given what uninvolved lawyers have predicted, including Duke Law's own Thomas Metzloff. Metzloff has stated that he believes the motion is "future-oriented" to inform the judge of the publicity the case is likely to receive and to ensure that the website does not, at a future date, cross the line in terms of prejudicing a jury. Powerline's Paul Mirengoff noted that "setting up this kind of website, and indeed ones that are much more aggressive, is a common thing for plaintiffs to do these days."

A likely explanation for Duke's motion was offered by one of KC Johnson's more thoughtful commenters - a litigator himself - suggesting that the motion was likely an attempt to gauge the judge's receptiveness to the possibility of limiting discovery. Duke's lawyers may believe - or may know for a fact as Pam Bernard of Duke's General Counsel has been collecting the emails of all university employees involved since early last fall - that discovery in this affair has the potential to become very painful for the Duke University defendants in particular regardless of what it contributes to the legal case. The embarrassment of such publicity alone could potentially be a motivation for Duke to settle simply to keep such information out of the public eye.

Monday, April 14, 2008

The Chronicle published a brief report today, though we expect there is much more to come. We will keep you updated as we learn more. We understand that this young lady has been viciously threatened, as well as her family back home.

Friday, April 4, 2008

Duke recently won an unfortunate award for hosting the Sex Workers Art Show as the SWAS continues to make headlines. ISI awarded Duke University the Grand Prize for 2008 for what Larry Moneta apparently called “a hallmark of the intellectual environment [students] will experience at Duke.” The prize money of $1000 for the Grand Prize will go to the New Right Review for Angela Czahor's and David Bitner's pieces on the affair. Congratulations to all involved!

Congratulations go to the runner up, the University of Delaware, for a an extremely valiant effort to outrage every sane person in the nation with their absurd racial training program, which defined "a racist" as a term that "applies to all white people." It is tough to imagine a more worthy adversary.

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

The Chronicle front page today featured a number of April Fools Day stories. We aren't sure if they are available online, but one of them was quite well done and worth reprinting. Ken Larrey agrees they got his number. Here it is:

Man sues Duke for bracket lossBy Boobs Allison

John Matthews, Trinity '69, is suing the University for emotional damage and conspiracy after the men's basketball team's loss to West Virginia, putting him at the bottom of his NCAA bracket pool. The suit was announced on JuicyCampus.com in a thread entitled, "What does a bracket disaster look like?" Readers rated the thread 88-percent juicy. Suits were rumored last week when John Burnedout, vice president for government affairs and public relations, announced that the University had added literary attorney Atticus Finch to its legal team. "A lot of people said it couldn't be done, because [Finch] is fictional. And over-qualified. It's really unprecedented," he said. "We're prepared to defend the University vigorously in this matter, by way of seances and memoranda." Duke's attorneys filed a motion Friday saying that Mathews had broken state bar rules in publicizing his suit and called for JuicyCampus to be shut down. Burnedout said the details of the University's legal strategy were a secret that many wouldn't understand. Duke Students for a Moral Duke President Ben T. Jarry, a super-senior, said Duke's motion was actually a thinly-veiled aspect of Laurence "Of Arabia" Vendetta's "secret file" to have a post removed that criticized the West Campus Plaza and veganism. "I have been told by a number of sources, including members of the Board of Trustees, that Duke is screwed," Jarry said. "Oh wait- can I go off the record? I'm not sure I can say that," he said.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Charles Cooper, attorney for the 38 lacrosse players, has filed a response to Duke's motion claiming a violation of Rule 3.6 by the plaintiffs' attorneys. Dukelawsuit.com has posted the response pointing out both the legal and logical absurdities of Duke's motion and much more credibly claiming ethical violations by Duke's lawyer Pam Bernard:

Duke’s motion is extraordinary. Duke not only acknowledges that the specific extrajudicial attorney statements it challenges either directly quote or closely paraphrase the allegations of Plaintiffs’ Complaint, it concedes that such statements are expressly authorized by Rule 3.6(b)(2)’s so-called “safe harbor” for attorney comments that relate “information in a public record.”

[...]

But Duke’s motion is even more remarkable for what it does not say. Nowhere does Duke cite a single case in which a court, state or federal, has imposed sanctions or otherwise enforced the attorney speech restrictions of Rule 3.6 in civil litigation, and our research has turned up no such case. Duke’s motion thus seeks a ruling from this Court that appears to be without precedent in American jurisprudence.

[...]

Nor does Duke, finally, even refer to, let alone cite any evidence for, this Court’s supposed “very strict practice forbidding lawyers from discussing their litigation with the press” in civil cases such as this. We assume that Duke’s counsel had a good faith basis for making this representation to Plaintiff’s counsel, notwithstanding their failure to provide any.

[...]

We note initially our disagreement with Duke’s claim that the passages from the press release excerpted in Duke’s brief are framed in “incendiary language”... indeed, even now we are hard pressed to see how we might edit the statements to make them less embarrassing to Duke. [emphasis added]

[...]

If Duke had not so callously and deliberately violated its contractual and legal duties to its innocent students, it would not now be facing these historically unprecedented legal actions by what effectively amounts to its entire 2006 lacrosse team.

[...]

Duke accuses Mr. Henkelman of speaking “in a manner calculated to engender sympathy,” Duke Br. 12, but no calculation or artifice is necessary to render sympathetic the prolonged anguish of a parent who has been forced to watch helplessly as his innocent child was falsely condemned by officials, professors, and students of the very institution that agreed to educate and care for him. Yes, Mr. Henkelman’s words were indeed poignant and moving, and it is not surprising that Duke cringes with embarrassment to hear them. But that is hardly a reason to silence him. [emphasis added]

[...]

Duke itself, of course, also has a very sophisticated website on which it provides links to news stories and posts its own frequent press releases, including those about the lacrosse incident. Duke includes one such press release as an exhibit to its submission here, in which Duke’s General Counsel, Pamela Bernard, openly violates the confidentiality of settlement negotiations by revealing what purport to be details of a settlement offer made by Duke to the Plaintiffs...In contrast, when asked about Ms. Bernard’s press statement during the Plaintiffs’ February 21 press conference, Mr. Cooper declined to discuss the substance of the parties’ confidential settlement discussions. [emphasis added]

Duke’s counsel represent to this Court that Ms. Bernard’s press release was issued only “[i]n the face of [plaintiffs’] publicity,” and out of Duke’s “belie[f] that a statement was required to protect the Duke Defendants from the substantial undue prejudicial effect of this publicity which was initiated by the Plaintiffs . . . .” Duke Br. 6. But Duke issued a materially indistinguishable press release on December 18, 2007, in response to the filing of a similar civil action in this Court by three other lacrosse players, a filing which was not accompanied by any press release or press conference. (link) And Ms. Bernard also issued a press release in response to the state court action filed against Duke by former lacrosse team coach Mike Pressler, although the filing of his suit was not accompanied by a press release or a press conference. (link) Perhaps Duke’s counsel will be able to explain the purpose of these unprovoked press releases in their reply brief. [emphasis added]

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

[The series Lawsuit Breakdown will attempt to highlight the main points of the lawsuit filed on 12/18/07by attorneys for Ryan McFayden, Matt Wilson and Breck Archer with a focus on Duke University's involvement in the scandal.]

In what is one of the more surprising revelations in this lawsuit, Ekstrand's lawsuit introduces allegations that the Lacrosse Ad Hoc Review Committee's report (Coleman report), long recognized as a "stunning vindication" (link) of the lacrosse team from every accusation of significance about the lacrosse team's culture, was based on deliberately fraudulent statistics. It should be noted that the lawsuit does not fault James Coleman or others on the committee for the conclusions of the report as the suit seems to believe the committee was mislead by Director of Judicial Affairs Stephen Bryan.

The significance of this allegation cannot be underestimated. Of all the assertions of horrific misbehavior - racism, violence, misogyny and of course rape - hurled at the lacrosse players publicly and privately by both faculty and administrators, the only accusations that have held any water amounted to minor, alcohol related irresponsibility and inconsiderateness. These kinds of infractions were so insignificant that the University did not even keep statistics of them until October 2004. Now it seems even those allegations were exaggerated by Duke nearly to the point of fabrication.

This section of the lawsuit is highly intriguing and seems well substantiated. It is worth reading in full to view the entirety of Ekstrand's substantiation. In summary the most incriminating assertion of fact is that Dean Bryan provided to the committee phony data from before October 2004. In October 2004, "the University began systematically recording data of incidents of all alcohol policy violations involving students" (p. 254). Furthermore, "it was Bryan's arbitrary enforcement of the alcohol policy that prompted the Campus Committee's 2004 Initiative" (p. 254). Yet inexplicably "Bryan concealed the existence" (p. 255) of the data collected systematically after October 2004 and "provided the Committee with unreliable and grossly misleading data sets [from before Oct. 2004] in order to induce the Committee to conclude that the lacrosse team members' conduct was out of step with that of comparison groups" (p. 255).

As brief examples of their absurdity, Bryan's statistics, as reported by the Ad Hoc Committee, held lacrosse players accountable for "50% of noise violations and 33% of open container violations" (p. 256) based on single instances of such violations by lacrosse players. If the idea that there were fewer than 5 such violations combined by Duke students in any significant time frame isn't in itself preposterous, Ekstrand notes that the University was well aware of a well publicized incident in the fall of 2006 where 7 students were given 7 noise violations and 7 open container violations in one night alone.

The report was slanted by absurd statistics to begin with, but even more relevant is the overtly slanted way in which the report has been used by administrators. Though Ekstrand does not mention it in the lawsuit, Brodhead, speaking of the report on June 5, asserted, “though it did not confirm the worst allegations against this team, [it] documents a history of irresponsible conduct that this university cannot allow to continue” (Until Proven Innocent p. 237).

Perhaps most telling of all is that the report, which was scheduled ("forced," claims Ekstrand) to present one day before the primary election for Nifong, was given to Nifong in advance but not to the players or their counsel: "Defendant Burness delivered an advance copy of the Ad Hoc Committee Report to the City of Durham Defendants so they could prepare statements for the press conferences. Burness did not send a copy of the Ad Hoc Report - in advance or after its release - to the Plaintiffs, their teammates or their counsel" (p. 260). An oversight? Perhaps. The problem for Burness and the rest of the Duke Administration is that it fits into a rather telling pattern of efforts by Duke not only to aid Nifong in his attempts to railroad Duke Students, but to assist in his reelection. These efforts by the Duke Administration are continued in shocking fashion before the general election in the fall of 2006, explained in the next segment of Lawsuit Breakdown.

"The myth of the Plaintiffs and their teammates as out-of-control, aberrant, abusers of alcohol, with a history of 'deplorable' behavior persists up to the present day" (p. 260), incited and continuously perpetuated by Brodhead and other Duke administrators and faculty.

The film is available as a high-quality MPEG-4 file or as a Virtual DVD, which allows you to burn your own DVD copy of "Indoctrinate U" and watch it on your TV. (The Virtual DVD is a standards-compliant ISO file.)

The MPEG-4 file and the Virtual DVD are compatible with Mac, Windows and Linux.

ALSO:

There are a number of new screenings that have been added to the schedule over the coming weeks:

Note: Physical DVDs are not yet available, and will not be available for a number of weeks. If you can't make it to a local screening, downloading the MPEG-4 file or the Virtual DVD is the only way to see the film soon.

Sunday, March 2, 2008

[The series Lawsuit Breakdown will attempt to highlight the main points of the lawsuit filed on 12/18/07by attorneys for Ryan McFayden, Matt Wilson and Breck Archer with a focus on Duke University's involvement in the scandal.]

Ekstrand explains that before indicting Reade Seligmann and Colin Finnerty, Himan and Gottlieb not only had almost no evidence on which to indict the clearly innocent players, but also had "very little evidence that either Collin or Reade were present at the party at the relevant time" (p. 249). Fearing the possibility "one or both of those young men could immediately prove that they had no opportunity" (p. 249) to commit the alleged crime, "Himan and Gottlieb colluded with Duke Police officers to compel several team members to provide the information necessary to place Collin and Reade" (p. 250) at the party. As we now know, both Colin and Reade could prove they were miles away at the time of the alleged rape, and as Nifong and the officers had feared, Reade presented his impenetrable alibi one day after being indicted, making it clear that they had just indicted one - if not two - clearly innocent people.

The alleged conspiracy took form in two parts, both on April 13, 2006. First, on the morning of April 13, "conspirators whose identities are not as yet known to the plaintiffs sent an email through Breck Archer's 'duke.edu' email account. The email stated, 'I am going to go to the police tomorrow to tell them everything I know'" (p. 250). It seems Ekstrand is alleging that this email was created at the request or demand of Durham Police and may well have been facilitated by cooperation from the Duke Police and other Duke entities. If Ekstrand is correct, the purpose of the email would likely have been to stir up commotion on the team's email list that might have revealed information.

Second on the evening of April 13, Duke Police officers allowed Himan and Gottlieb into the Edens dorms "where most of the sophomore team members lived" (p. 250) in an effort to "develop evidence that Seligmann and Finnerty" (p. 250) were at the party (Reade and Colin were sophomores). The officers "cornered team members in their dorms" (p. 251), but instead of asking about the party, they "only asked who was (and was not) present at the party" (p. 251).

One player targeted by Gottlieb and Himan was Michael Young, who the investigators already knew had not attended the party. Furthermore, Himan "had specifically been told by Young's attorney that he was not to speak with his client" (p. 251). When asked, Young "guessed that Collin [sic] and Reade were both at the party because he did not see them in the dorms until after midnight" (p. 251).

All of this constitutes significant misconduct by the police that was aided and later condoned and justified by the Duke Police. When news broke of this police misconduct, Police Chief Graves publicly acknowledged the Duke Police's participation, condoned the misconduct and even left out the word "alleged" when referring to the rape.

Ekstrand characterizes these actions as a conspiracy "to force the waiver of plaintiffs' and their teammates' asserted constitutional rights" (p. 249).

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Charles Cooper, lawyer for the 38 lacrosse players now collectively suing Duke University, held a press conference today to announce the filing of their lawsuit against both Duke and Durham. They have created a website, www.dukelawsuit.com, to keep individuals informed about the status of the suit.

We will begin another series breaking down this 225 page lawsuit shortly, in addition to finishing up the Lawsuit Breakdown series on the Ekstrand Lawsuit.

There seem to already be clear differences between the two lawsuits. Ekstrand seems to have adopted a somewhat more aggressive strategy early on while Cooper seems to be approaching the suit a more cautiously. It will be interesting to see how these potentially complementary approaches play out. It is interesting that most of the significant facts alleged in each lawsuit are the same, corroborating each suit.

Also noteworthy is that Ekstrand's lawsuit carries an interesting focus on Chairman of the Board of Trustees Bob Steel and seems to place him as the lead decision maker. In contrast, Cooper's lawsuit places the blame primarily on the shoulders of President Richard Brodhead. Both suits, however, place heaping blame upon the duo for the suppression of evidence and other efforts to interfere with the team's pursuit of justice, so there is plenty to go around.

However, at this time, Bob Steel's name is noticeably absent from the list of defendants in the Cooper lawsuit.

The most significant difference between the Ekstrand and Cooper lawsuits consists not of factual assertions but of the allegations. Ekstrand repeatedly levels accusations of an active "conspiracy" involving Duke officials whereas Cooper's lawsuit is much more cautious in using that word. Perhaps time will show how these lawsuits evolve as they are modified and amended in the coming months.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

I was disappointed the other day when a Chronicle article mistakenly asserted that I was "offended" by the Sex Workers' Art Show. That is precisely not the point of Duke Students for an Ethical Duke's efforts to bring national media attention to the matter, as we are not in the business of defining what is socially acceptable on this campus. We are, among other things, in the business of ensuring that Duke's own rules are created for and applied fairly to all students.

From reading The Chronicle, you might have thought that DSED and I want to keep similar shows out of Duke.

Quite the contrary, I encourage student groups to hire as many strippers as they like. I'm eager to see what happens when a fraternity sponsors an educational strip show intended "to get people talking about fraternity culture in a way that they never do normally." We'll see if Duke's opinion of stripping transforms from sexual expression and female liberation to exploitation and sexual gratification.

The show, of course, violated Duke's policy on strippers. Publicly, Vice President for Student Affairs Larry Moneta has fiercely asserted that Duke's commitment to "free speech" and "academic freedom" permitted the recent sex show. In person, when I inquired about the policy conflict saying Duke can't have it both ways, Moneta responded, "I can." Why? Because "I can make the distinction" between personal gratification and education, he said.

So these distinctions are entrusted to Larry "Water Buffalo" Moneta, who classifies sticking a sparkler in one's anus as "speech" and finds bouncing breasts "academic." What might people have learned? "I have no response," Moneta wrote in an e-mail. Then how do you know the show was educational? "I'm done with this conversation," he said.

I may or may not personally agree with what you're doing, but the next time any student group wants to throw a stripper-fest on campus, I will defend to the death your apparent right to have strippers regardless of race, gender, class or ideology. In fact, we will even help ensure you get sponsorship from the University and Cultural Funds.

Topless car wash in the blue zone? Wet T-shirt contest in the Bryan Center? Call it the Larry Moneta Wet Water Buffalo Blast, call it artistic and educational and we'll see to it that you have your event.

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